Showing posts with label Ilhan Omar. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ilhan Omar. Show all posts
Saturday, August 8, 2020
Thursday, July 25, 2019
The Times has given Ilhan Omar a pulpit
It Is Not Enough to Condemn Trump’s Racism
She writes in part,
The reasons for weaponizing division are not mysterious.
Racial fear prevents Americans from building community with one another — and community is the lifeblood of a functioning democratic society.
Perfectly true.
Throughout our history, racist language has been used to turn American against American in order to benefit the wealthy elite.
True, sort of, but not the whole truth.
That isn't why Democrats and their allies use it, for example.
Nor does it explain why Democrats constantly accuse Republicans of racism and exaggerate the threat of such racism as there is.
Later, she writes,
The only way to push back is to be unequivocal about our values.
It is not enough to condemn Mr. Trump’s racism.
We must affirmatively confront racist policies — whether the caging of immigrant children at the border or the banning of Muslim immigrants . . .
Have Muslim immigrants been banned?
. . . or the allowing of segregation in public housing.
Is that allowed?
She continues,
The consequences of this fight will not just be felt here at home but around the world.
From the look of things, true, but not very much.
Right-wing nationalism in Hungary, Russia, France, Britain and elsewhere is on the march in ways not seen in decades.
America has been a beacon of democratic ideals for the world.
If we succumb to the fever of right-wing nationalism, it will have consequences far beyond our borders.
Have we not already succumbed?
What more does she fear by way of succumbing?
And what consequences beyond our borders?
Today, democracy is under attack once again.
Where? Not in America, really.
It’s time to respond with the kind of conviction that has made America great before.
By doing what, does she think, besides electing Democrats, I wonder.
She writes in part,
The reasons for weaponizing division are not mysterious.
Racial fear prevents Americans from building community with one another — and community is the lifeblood of a functioning democratic society.
Perfectly true.
Throughout our history, racist language has been used to turn American against American in order to benefit the wealthy elite.
True, sort of, but not the whole truth.
That isn't why Democrats and their allies use it, for example.
Nor does it explain why Democrats constantly accuse Republicans of racism and exaggerate the threat of such racism as there is.
Later, she writes,
The only way to push back is to be unequivocal about our values.
It is not enough to condemn Mr. Trump’s racism.
We must affirmatively confront racist policies — whether the caging of immigrant children at the border or the banning of Muslim immigrants . . .
Have Muslim immigrants been banned?
. . . or the allowing of segregation in public housing.
Is that allowed?
She continues,
The consequences of this fight will not just be felt here at home but around the world.
From the look of things, true, but not very much.
Right-wing nationalism in Hungary, Russia, France, Britain and elsewhere is on the march in ways not seen in decades.
America has been a beacon of democratic ideals for the world.
If we succumb to the fever of right-wing nationalism, it will have consequences far beyond our borders.
Have we not already succumbed?
What more does she fear by way of succumbing?
And what consequences beyond our borders?
Today, democracy is under attack once again.
Where? Not in America, really.
It’s time to respond with the kind of conviction that has made America great before.
By doing what, does she think, besides electing Democrats, I wonder.
Wednesday, July 10, 2019
Parts of his case against Ilhan Omar are better than the case against him
Tucker Carlson Tonight.
Some of his attacks on Ilhan Omar appeared quite compelling.
Not quite a Rev. Wright, "God damn America" moment (I can still remember liberal talking heads defending, justifying Wright's call upon God to damn America), her mockery of her professor's view of al-Qaeda was questionable.
[How often have we seen white liberal politicians telling the cameras "I'd be rioting, too! I'd be burning things down, too!"?]
Others of the attacks, his or his guests', appeared weak.
One claimed that over half of all hate crimes in the US target Jews.
But the FBI reported that only 20% of hate crimes are religion based, and crimes targeting Jews accounted for more than half of those.
On the other hand, this is surprising, given the wailing of the left about Islamophobia.
Religious-based hate crime comprised about 20 percent of the total [of hate crimes].
The FBI data shows Jewish people and institutions were most frequently targeted, accounting for 58.1 percent of religious-based hate crime incidents.
Muslims were the second most frequent target, at 18.6 percent.
Some of his attacks on Ilhan Omar appeared quite compelling.
Not quite a Rev. Wright, "God damn America" moment (I can still remember liberal talking heads defending, justifying Wright's call upon God to damn America), her mockery of her professor's view of al-Qaeda was questionable.
[How often have we seen white liberal politicians telling the cameras "I'd be rioting, too! I'd be burning things down, too!"?]
Others of the attacks, his or his guests', appeared weak.
One claimed that over half of all hate crimes in the US target Jews.
But the FBI reported that only 20% of hate crimes are religion based, and crimes targeting Jews accounted for more than half of those.
On the other hand, this is surprising, given the wailing of the left about Islamophobia.
Religious-based hate crime comprised about 20 percent of the total [of hate crimes].
The FBI data shows Jewish people and institutions were most frequently targeted, accounting for 58.1 percent of religious-based hate crime incidents.
Muslims were the second most frequent target, at 18.6 percent.
How will that play in the general?
Also-ran Beto sounding like the racial radicals among the Dems, not just the candidates but the party as a whole.
O'Rourke tells immigrants 'this country was founded on white supremacy'
Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) this week told a group of immigrants and refugees living in Nashville, Tenn., that the U.S. was founded on the concepts of white supremacy and slavery.
. . . .
"I know this from my home state, Texas, places that formed the Confederacy, that this country was founded on white supremacy," he said, according to the Tennessean.
. . . .
He made the remarks in response to a question about how he would tackle white supremacy if elected president.
To which the best answer would have been that white supremacy in America is a long gone thing of the past, and what people are really complaining of who say otherwise is the fact that the majority of Americans are white.
And to that complaint the best answer, if not "pardon us for living", would have been "fuck you."
I suppose we could quibble a bit about the nuance of "founded on", but those were certainly features of the country at its founding.
So, no Pinocchios for that one.
But this is just inflammatory bullshit.
Or maybe a concession to the lying racism of the person who asked the question.
"And every single institution and structure that we have in this country still reflects the legacy of slavery and segregation and Jim Crow and suppression, even in our democracy."
Does his saying that, and to a batch of new immigrants and refugees, no less, show he hates our country?
Actually, I'm not sure what the hell it shows, though in his case I rather doubt it's that.
A lot of this year's Democrats talk like that, however, and maybe that is what it shows when they talk like that.
And, anyway, whose votes are they fishing for, with that kind of talk?
Is this that Tucker Carlson apparently said quite unfair?
All of it, or just parts of it?
TUCKER CARLSON (HOST):
The Democratic candidates for president are on the road this week telling voters that the United States is an awful country.
"America's institutions are built on white supremacy," squeaked Beto O'Rourke at an event yesterday.
Of all the lies these people tell, and there are many, this is the most absurd.
...
Ilhan Omar has an awful lot to be grateful for, but she isn't grateful, not at all.
After everything America has done for Omar and for her family, she hates this country more than ever.
In a recent piece in The Washington Post, the reporter put it this way, quote,
"In Omar's version, America isn't the bighearted country that saved her from a brutal war and a bleak refugee camp.
"It wasn't a meritocracy that helped her attend college or vaulted her into congress.
"Instead, it was the country that had failed to live up to its founding ideals, a place that has disappointed her and so many immigrants, refugees, and minorities like her," end quote.
If anything, that's an understatement.
Omar isn't disappointed in America, she's enraged by it.
Virtually every public statement she makes accuses Americans of bigotry and racism.
This is an immoral country, she says.
She has undisguised contempt for the United States and for its people.
. . . .
Ilhan Omar is living proof that the way we practice immigration has become dangerous to this country.
A system designed to strengthen America is instead undermining it.
Some of the very people we try hardest to help have come to hate us passionately.
O'Rourke tells immigrants 'this country was founded on white supremacy'
Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) this week told a group of immigrants and refugees living in Nashville, Tenn., that the U.S. was founded on the concepts of white supremacy and slavery.
. . . .
"I know this from my home state, Texas, places that formed the Confederacy, that this country was founded on white supremacy," he said, according to the Tennessean.
. . . .
He made the remarks in response to a question about how he would tackle white supremacy if elected president.
To which the best answer would have been that white supremacy in America is a long gone thing of the past, and what people are really complaining of who say otherwise is the fact that the majority of Americans are white.
And to that complaint the best answer, if not "pardon us for living", would have been "fuck you."
I suppose we could quibble a bit about the nuance of "founded on", but those were certainly features of the country at its founding.
So, no Pinocchios for that one.
But this is just inflammatory bullshit.
Or maybe a concession to the lying racism of the person who asked the question.
"And every single institution and structure that we have in this country still reflects the legacy of slavery and segregation and Jim Crow and suppression, even in our democracy."
Does his saying that, and to a batch of new immigrants and refugees, no less, show he hates our country?
Actually, I'm not sure what the hell it shows, though in his case I rather doubt it's that.
A lot of this year's Democrats talk like that, however, and maybe that is what it shows when they talk like that.
And, anyway, whose votes are they fishing for, with that kind of talk?
Is this that Tucker Carlson apparently said quite unfair?
All of it, or just parts of it?
TUCKER CARLSON (HOST):
The Democratic candidates for president are on the road this week telling voters that the United States is an awful country.
"America's institutions are built on white supremacy," squeaked Beto O'Rourke at an event yesterday.
Of all the lies these people tell, and there are many, this is the most absurd.
...
Ilhan Omar has an awful lot to be grateful for, but she isn't grateful, not at all.
After everything America has done for Omar and for her family, she hates this country more than ever.
In a recent piece in The Washington Post, the reporter put it this way, quote,
"In Omar's version, America isn't the bighearted country that saved her from a brutal war and a bleak refugee camp.
"It wasn't a meritocracy that helped her attend college or vaulted her into congress.
"Instead, it was the country that had failed to live up to its founding ideals, a place that has disappointed her and so many immigrants, refugees, and minorities like her," end quote.
If anything, that's an understatement.
Omar isn't disappointed in America, she's enraged by it.
Virtually every public statement she makes accuses Americans of bigotry and racism.
This is an immoral country, she says.
She has undisguised contempt for the United States and for its people.
. . . .
Ilhan Omar is living proof that the way we practice immigration has become dangerous to this country.
A system designed to strengthen America is instead undermining it.
Some of the very people we try hardest to help have come to hate us passionately.
Tuesday, April 16, 2019
Trump and the GOP are campaigning on hate
Why not?
It's what he did the last time.
Muslim ban, wall, deportation police, cancel DACA.
Ilhan Omar has become the target of a dangerous hate campaign
By now, she is accused so often of various speech and thought crimes that she almost seems like a figure in the Two Minutes Hate, the daily ritual used to whip party members into a frenzy in George Orwell’s novel 1984.
In Orwell’s dystopia, the enemy of the people was the very Jewish-sounding Emmanuel Goldstein.
If you believe some pundits, today’s enemy of the people is the very Muslim-looking Ilhan Omar.
. . . .
In scoring their cheap political points, Fox News and the New York Post and the president of the United States himself are directly contributing to a perilous climate of vigilantism that threatens not only Omar but really every Muslim in America today.
On one level, it’s clear why Omar is subject to these attacks.
Omar is black, a woman, an immigrant, a refugee and a Muslim.
The fact that racism, sexism and bigotry drive a double-standard where Omar faces criticism while others received little to no scrutiny for the same comments is self-evident.
But that’s also not the full explanation.
This double standard that is applied to Omar is meant to keep us from listening to what she is actually saying and doing.
To call Stephen Miller a white nationalist, as Omar did, is to state an obvious truth. Omar added that “the fact that he still has influence on policy and political appointments is an outrage.”
Rather than paying attention to her words, Omar was again caricatured as an anti-Semite.
“Congresswoman Ilhan Omar has a well-documented history of antisemitic comments, social media posts and relationships,” the White House said, “so it’s not surprising that she would wildly attack a Jewish member of the administration.”
In fact, we should be paying all kinds of attention to Omar’s words and actions.
She is principled and outspoken against all types of human rights abuses, having criticized Saudi Arabia for its war in Yemen, spoken out against Chinese repression of the Uighur population, stood with the Sudanese people in their uprising, opposed American intervention in Venezuela, grilled Elliott Abrams about his atrocious human rights record, and more.
She is a cosponsor of the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, and has already introduced the Protect Against Unlawful Lobbying Act of 2019, and the Federal Worker Childcare Protection Act of 2019.
Most recently, she cosponsored a bi-cameral bill to end Donald Trump’s Muslim ban.
And she only began her job in January.
It's what he did the last time.
Muslim ban, wall, deportation police, cancel DACA.
Ilhan Omar has become the target of a dangerous hate campaign
By now, she is accused so often of various speech and thought crimes that she almost seems like a figure in the Two Minutes Hate, the daily ritual used to whip party members into a frenzy in George Orwell’s novel 1984.
In Orwell’s dystopia, the enemy of the people was the very Jewish-sounding Emmanuel Goldstein.
If you believe some pundits, today’s enemy of the people is the very Muslim-looking Ilhan Omar.
. . . .
In scoring their cheap political points, Fox News and the New York Post and the president of the United States himself are directly contributing to a perilous climate of vigilantism that threatens not only Omar but really every Muslim in America today.
On one level, it’s clear why Omar is subject to these attacks.
Omar is black, a woman, an immigrant, a refugee and a Muslim.
The fact that racism, sexism and bigotry drive a double-standard where Omar faces criticism while others received little to no scrutiny for the same comments is self-evident.
But that’s also not the full explanation.
This double standard that is applied to Omar is meant to keep us from listening to what she is actually saying and doing.
To call Stephen Miller a white nationalist, as Omar did, is to state an obvious truth. Omar added that “the fact that he still has influence on policy and political appointments is an outrage.”
Rather than paying attention to her words, Omar was again caricatured as an anti-Semite.
“Congresswoman Ilhan Omar has a well-documented history of antisemitic comments, social media posts and relationships,” the White House said, “so it’s not surprising that she would wildly attack a Jewish member of the administration.”
In fact, we should be paying all kinds of attention to Omar’s words and actions.
She is principled and outspoken against all types of human rights abuses, having criticized Saudi Arabia for its war in Yemen, spoken out against Chinese repression of the Uighur population, stood with the Sudanese people in their uprising, opposed American intervention in Venezuela, grilled Elliott Abrams about his atrocious human rights record, and more.
She is a cosponsor of the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, and has already introduced the Protect Against Unlawful Lobbying Act of 2019, and the Federal Worker Childcare Protection Act of 2019.
Most recently, she cosponsored a bi-cameral bill to end Donald Trump’s Muslim ban.
And she only began her job in January.
No accident this happened while they are so savaging Ilhan Omar
Anti-Zionists Deserve Free Speech
Michelle Goldberg.
Subtitle: The Trump administration bars a critic of Israel from America.
They would like to force her to resign (Trump has demanded it), or force the House to deny her her seat.
Yes, pour encourager les autres.
The Palestinian activist Omar Barghouti, one of the founders of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, was supposed to be on a speaking tour of the United States this week, with stops at N.Y.U.’s Washington campus and at Harvard.
He was going to attend his daughter’s wedding in Texas.
. . . .
Yet when Barghouti, a permanent resident of Israel, showed up for his flight from Israel’s Ben Gurion International Airport last week, he was informed that the United States was denying him entry.
. . . .
Around two dozen states have laws and regulations denouncing, and in many cases penalizing, B.D.S. activities, and the Senate recently passed a bill supporting such measures.
According to the American Association of University Professors, some public universities in states with such laws require speakers and other contractors to “sign a statement pledging that they do not now, nor will they in the future, endorse B.D.S.”
It’s hard to think of comparable speech restrictions on any other subject.
It's also hard to imagine any of that is constitutional.
The B.D.S. movement doesn’t engage in or promote violence.
Its leaders make an effort to separate anti-Zionism from anti-Semitism; the Palestinian B.D.S. National Committee recently demanded that a Moroccan group stop using the term “B.D.S.” in its name because it featured anti-Semitic cartoons on its Facebook page.
Barghouti couches his opposition to Zionism in the language of humanist universalism.
The official position of the B.D.S. movement, he says, is that “any supremacist, exclusionary state in historic Palestine — be it a ‘Jewish state,’ an ‘Islamic state,’ or a ‘Christian state’ — would by definition conflict with international law and basic human rights principles.”
The movement is agnostic on a final dispensation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
But it calls for the right of Palestinian refugees — both those displaced by the creation of Israel and their descendants — to return to their familial homes, which would likely end Israel’s Jewish majority.
A one state solution increasingly popular among liberal Americans.
Quite different from the one state solution Bibi is moving toward, one far less dangerous to the Jews of Israel than the liberal one.
And less dangerous, probably, than a two state solution relying perilously on arrangements even more restrictive than those of the Versailles Treaty that ended the Great War.
We know how well that worked out.
Fortunately for the French, the Germans at no point threatened, considered, or even entertained their complete annihilation.
Yet exactly that is the proclaimed desire of many of the Palestinians, many in important leadership positions, who would live in that other state, disarmed and humiliated.
Disarmed?
Well, at least officially, probably.
And at least at first.
Barghouti told me he personally believes in the creation of a single state in which Israeli Jews, as individuals, would have civil rights, but Jews as a people would not have national rights.
I’d planned to argue with him about this view, which is largely dismissive of Jewish claims on Israel, and would likely lead to oppression or worse for Israeli Jews.
My guess is that many if not most Jews find such a position offensive, even frightening.
. . . .
A government that tries to prevent Americans from engaging with his views cannot claim a commitment to free speech.
. . . .
Ultimately, Barghouti threatens Israel’s American defenders not because he’s hateful, but because he isn’t.
Israel has aligned itself with the global far right.
Recently re-elected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to unilaterally annex the West Bank, which would create a single state where Jews rule over Arabs.
That prospect makes it ever more difficult for Israel’s American defenders to make coherent arguments against the sort of one-state solution that Barghouti espouses. “
Michelle Goldberg.
Subtitle: The Trump administration bars a critic of Israel from America.
They would like to force her to resign (Trump has demanded it), or force the House to deny her her seat.
Yes, pour encourager les autres.
The Palestinian activist Omar Barghouti, one of the founders of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, was supposed to be on a speaking tour of the United States this week, with stops at N.Y.U.’s Washington campus and at Harvard.
He was going to attend his daughter’s wedding in Texas.
. . . .
Yet when Barghouti, a permanent resident of Israel, showed up for his flight from Israel’s Ben Gurion International Airport last week, he was informed that the United States was denying him entry.
. . . .
Around two dozen states have laws and regulations denouncing, and in many cases penalizing, B.D.S. activities, and the Senate recently passed a bill supporting such measures.
According to the American Association of University Professors, some public universities in states with such laws require speakers and other contractors to “sign a statement pledging that they do not now, nor will they in the future, endorse B.D.S.”
It’s hard to think of comparable speech restrictions on any other subject.
It's also hard to imagine any of that is constitutional.
The B.D.S. movement doesn’t engage in or promote violence.
Its leaders make an effort to separate anti-Zionism from anti-Semitism; the Palestinian B.D.S. National Committee recently demanded that a Moroccan group stop using the term “B.D.S.” in its name because it featured anti-Semitic cartoons on its Facebook page.
Barghouti couches his opposition to Zionism in the language of humanist universalism.
The official position of the B.D.S. movement, he says, is that “any supremacist, exclusionary state in historic Palestine — be it a ‘Jewish state,’ an ‘Islamic state,’ or a ‘Christian state’ — would by definition conflict with international law and basic human rights principles.”
The movement is agnostic on a final dispensation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
But it calls for the right of Palestinian refugees — both those displaced by the creation of Israel and their descendants — to return to their familial homes, which would likely end Israel’s Jewish majority.
A one state solution increasingly popular among liberal Americans.
Quite different from the one state solution Bibi is moving toward, one far less dangerous to the Jews of Israel than the liberal one.
And less dangerous, probably, than a two state solution relying perilously on arrangements even more restrictive than those of the Versailles Treaty that ended the Great War.
We know how well that worked out.
Fortunately for the French, the Germans at no point threatened, considered, or even entertained their complete annihilation.
Yet exactly that is the proclaimed desire of many of the Palestinians, many in important leadership positions, who would live in that other state, disarmed and humiliated.
Disarmed?
Well, at least officially, probably.
And at least at first.
Barghouti told me he personally believes in the creation of a single state in which Israeli Jews, as individuals, would have civil rights, but Jews as a people would not have national rights.
I’d planned to argue with him about this view, which is largely dismissive of Jewish claims on Israel, and would likely lead to oppression or worse for Israeli Jews.
My guess is that many if not most Jews find such a position offensive, even frightening.
. . . .
A government that tries to prevent Americans from engaging with his views cannot claim a commitment to free speech.
. . . .
Ultimately, Barghouti threatens Israel’s American defenders not because he’s hateful, but because he isn’t.
Israel has aligned itself with the global far right.
Recently re-elected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to unilaterally annex the West Bank, which would create a single state where Jews rule over Arabs.
That prospect makes it ever more difficult for Israel’s American defenders to make coherent arguments against the sort of one-state solution that Barghouti espouses. “
Saturday, April 13, 2019
They are really going after Ilhan Omar. And Trump is lower than dog shit.
The entire Republican Party is lower than dog shit.
They are painting a target on her back.
Ilhan Omar defended by Democrats after Trump uses 9/11 video in attack
President Dogshit's tweet
[CAIR was not founded after 9/11 but in the 1990s, by the way.
And that "some people did something" was odd, though the point she was making was valid.]
And Pelosi seems to have a problem with her.
They are painting a target on her back.
Ilhan Omar defended by Democrats after Trump uses 9/11 video in attack
President Dogshit's tweet
[CAIR was not founded after 9/11 but in the 1990s, by the way.
And that "some people did something" was odd, though the point she was making was valid.]
And Pelosi seems to have a problem with her.
Up to now I have resisted use of "Islamophobia" since the term has been all too often used to deflect and stigmatize legitimate and fair criticism of Islam, Islamism, or Jihadi ideology, as "anti-Semitism" is frequently abused to deflect and stigmatize criticism of Israel or Zionism, and was recently abused in exactly that way by Trump, numerous Republicans, and some Democrats, against Congresswoman Omar.
But the lies and accusations and almost constant abuse of this young woman are incitements to hatred of her because she is a Muslim, because she is not white, because she is not a Christian, and because she speaks up in defense of Islam and of Muslims.
These incitements are acts of hatred aimed at inciting hatred.
Acts of Islamophobia aimed at incitement of Islamophobia.
[Update. She is rather an annoying person, I'll give you that. Doesn't make her a terrorist, traitor, Islamist, secret member of the Muslim Brotherhood, or enemy of us fine white Christian folks.]
Democrats including leading candidates for the presidential nomination have fiercely condemned Donald Trump and other Republicans’ efforts to smear the Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar, while urging other party leaders to do the same.
Attacks labeling one of two Muslim women in Congress as unpatriotic are “dangerous” and risk “inciting violence”, prominent progressives said on Friday, after Trump shared a video attacking Omar that included graphic footage of the 9/11 terror attacks.
A Republican congressman has spread false allegations that the US representative Ilhan Omar denied the September 11 hijackers were terrorists, as part of a new wave of abuse directed at her by some conservatives.
Representative Dan Crenshaw of Texas shared a tweet falsely reporting that Omar had said she “does not consider [September 11] a terrorist attack on the USA by terrorists”, while accusing the Minnesota congresswoman of playing down the attack.
Crenshaw was responding to a short video clip of a speech given by Omar in California last month, when she complained that all Muslims suffered the consequences of the actions by a small group of them on 11 September 2001, when al-Qaida terrorists hijacked four passenger jets and flew them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon building outside Washington, while one crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.
Crenshaw was joined by Ronna McDaniel, the Republican party chairwoman, who claimed Omar had shown she was “anti-American”, and the Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, who questioned Omar’s loyalty to the US during a broadcast on Wednesday morning.
Omar described the attacks against her as “dangerous incitement” and urged colleagues to condemn them.
[Update. She is rather an annoying person, I'll give you that. Doesn't make her a terrorist, traitor, Islamist, secret member of the Muslim Brotherhood, or enemy of us fine white Christian folks.]
Democrats including leading candidates for the presidential nomination have fiercely condemned Donald Trump and other Republicans’ efforts to smear the Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar, while urging other party leaders to do the same.
Attacks labeling one of two Muslim women in Congress as unpatriotic are “dangerous” and risk “inciting violence”, prominent progressives said on Friday, after Trump shared a video attacking Omar that included graphic footage of the 9/11 terror attacks.
. . . .
Just last week, a Trump supporter in New York was charged with threatening to kill Omar. On Friday, Trump escalated attacks on Omar, tweeting “WE WILL NEVER FORGET!” with a video edited to suggest Omar was dismissive of the September 11 attacks.
The video used part of a speech last month to the Council on American-Islamic Relations in which Omar discussed the problem of Islamophobia, describing “the discomfort of being a second-class citizen”. After September 11, she said, advocates “recognized that some people did something, and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties”.
Rightwing politicians focused on the line “some people did something” and suggested Omar was dismissing the gravity of 9/11.
Just last week, a Trump supporter in New York was charged with threatening to kill Omar. On Friday, Trump escalated attacks on Omar, tweeting “WE WILL NEVER FORGET!” with a video edited to suggest Omar was dismissive of the September 11 attacks.
The video used part of a speech last month to the Council on American-Islamic Relations in which Omar discussed the problem of Islamophobia, describing “the discomfort of being a second-class citizen”. After September 11, she said, advocates “recognized that some people did something, and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties”.
Rightwing politicians focused on the line “some people did something” and suggested Omar was dismissing the gravity of 9/11.
These lies are incitements to violence, and who can seriously say the perps don't know or intend that?
Google stochastic terrorism.
A Republican congressman has spread false allegations that the US representative Ilhan Omar denied the September 11 hijackers were terrorists, as part of a new wave of abuse directed at her by some conservatives.
Representative Dan Crenshaw of Texas shared a tweet falsely reporting that Omar had said she “does not consider [September 11] a terrorist attack on the USA by terrorists”, while accusing the Minnesota congresswoman of playing down the attack.
Crenshaw was responding to a short video clip of a speech given by Omar in California last month, when she complained that all Muslims suffered the consequences of the actions by a small group of them on 11 September 2001, when al-Qaida terrorists hijacked four passenger jets and flew them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon building outside Washington, while one crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.
Crenshaw was joined by Ronna McDaniel, the Republican party chairwoman, who claimed Omar had shown she was “anti-American”, and the Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, who questioned Omar’s loyalty to the US during a broadcast on Wednesday morning.
Omar described the attacks against her as “dangerous incitement” and urged colleagues to condemn them.
She said: “My love and commitment to our country and that of my colleagues should never be in question. We are ALL Americans!”
Trump under fire over Islamophobia after man threatens to kill Ilhan Omar
Trump under fire over Islamophobia after man threatens to kill Ilhan Omar
Subtitle: Ocasio-Cortez also makes direct link between controversial remarks by Fox News’s Jeanine Pirro and threat against Omar
Donald Trump and Fox News are coming under fire for contributing to a climate of Islamophobia, following the arrest of a supporter of the president who threatened to kill Ilhan Omar, a Democrat from Minnesota who was one of the first Muslim women elected to the US Congress.
Ilhan Omar: man arrested after he made death threat – then left contact details
Patrick Carlineo, from Addison, New York, was arrested on Friday and charged with making a threatening phone call to Omar’s office.
Donald Trump and Fox News are coming under fire for contributing to a climate of Islamophobia, following the arrest of a supporter of the president who threatened to kill Ilhan Omar, a Democrat from Minnesota who was one of the first Muslim women elected to the US Congress.
Ilhan Omar: man arrested after he made death threat – then left contact details
Patrick Carlineo, from Addison, New York, was arrested on Friday and charged with making a threatening phone call to Omar’s office.
According to the FBI, Carlineo told a staff member: “Do you work for the Muslim Brotherhood? Why are you working for her, she’s a fucking terrorist. I’ll put a bullet in her fucking skull.”
Though Fox News was not mentioned in the complaint against Carlineo, the New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew a direct link between controversial remarks made by the network’s presenter Jeanine Pirro and the threat against Omar.
Last month Pirro attacked Omar’s wearing of the hijab, asking if it was indicative of “her adherence to sharia law, which in itself is antithetical to the United States constitution”.
Though Fox News was not mentioned in the complaint against Carlineo, the New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew a direct link between controversial remarks made by the network’s presenter Jeanine Pirro and the threat against Omar.
Last month Pirro attacked Omar’s wearing of the hijab, asking if it was indicative of “her adherence to sharia law, which in itself is antithetical to the United States constitution”.
. . . .
Last month, in the wake of the shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, that killed 50 people, Omar accused Trump of whipping up the hatred that lay behind such violence.
Last month, in the wake of the shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, that killed 50 people, Omar accused Trump of whipping up the hatred that lay behind such violence.
She said Trump was a president who “publicly says Islam hates us, who fuels hate against Muslims, who thinks it is OK to speak about a faith and a whole community in a way that is dehumanizing, vilifying”.
The Somali American Muslim who represents Minnesota’s fifth congressional district is one of a group of dynamic Democratic women swept into Congress in November’s midterm elections.
The Somali American Muslim who represents Minnesota’s fifth congressional district is one of a group of dynamic Democratic women swept into Congress in November’s midterm elections.
As an outspoken critic of the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians, she has become a lightning rod for rightwing claims of antisemitism.
She was particularly heavily rounded upon after she highlighted the lobbying work of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Aipac, which she implied paid US politicians to take a pro-Israeli position.
She was particularly heavily rounded upon after she highlighted the lobbying work of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Aipac, which she implied paid US politicians to take a pro-Israeli position.
Tuesday, March 19, 2019
Monday, March 18, 2019
More conventional than I thought
Ilhan Omar Speaks Out On Israel In New Op-Ed
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), whose comments on U.S. financial ties to Israel sparked claims of anti-Semitism, called for an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a Washington Post op-ed published over the weekend.
“My goal in speaking out at all times has been to encourage both sides to move toward a peaceful two-state solution,” wrote Omar, a freshman lawmaker who supports Palestinian rights, in the column published on Saturday.
“We need to reinsert this call back into the public debate with urgency. Both parties must come to the table for a final peace deal; violence will not bring us any closer to that day.”
Omar said she recognized the historical foundations of Israel, but pointed to the need for Palestinians to have a state of their own.
“They, too, deserve freedom and dignity,” she wrote.
“A balanced, inclusive approach to the conflict recognizes the shared desire for security and freedom of both peoples,” Omar said, noting that a two-state solution has received bipartisan support in the U.S., as well as from Israelis and Palestinians.
The GOP and Bibi are really not into that two-state stuff, anymore.
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), whose comments on U.S. financial ties to Israel sparked claims of anti-Semitism, called for an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a Washington Post op-ed published over the weekend.
“My goal in speaking out at all times has been to encourage both sides to move toward a peaceful two-state solution,” wrote Omar, a freshman lawmaker who supports Palestinian rights, in the column published on Saturday.
“We need to reinsert this call back into the public debate with urgency. Both parties must come to the table for a final peace deal; violence will not bring us any closer to that day.”
Omar said she recognized the historical foundations of Israel, but pointed to the need for Palestinians to have a state of their own.
“They, too, deserve freedom and dignity,” she wrote.
“A balanced, inclusive approach to the conflict recognizes the shared desire for security and freedom of both peoples,” Omar said, noting that a two-state solution has received bipartisan support in the U.S., as well as from Israelis and Palestinians.
The GOP and Bibi are really not into that two-state stuff, anymore.
Sunday, March 17, 2019
Tlaib says Democrats' as well as Republicans' behavior toward Omar was motivated by Islamophobia, hints it's also racism and misogyny
And she's claiming others are not attacked for the same sort of remarks.
Omar's remarks were anti-Zionist but not anti-Semitic, so it was a bum rap.
But it was owing mostly to the power of The Lobby over both Republicans and Democrats.
On the other hand, it doubtless was pandering to Islamophobia on the GOP side of things.
Just as they endlessly pander to the victim ideology of white nationalists.
Omar's remarks were anti-Zionist but not anti-Semitic, so it was a bum rap.
But it was owing mostly to the power of The Lobby over both Republicans and Democrats.
On the other hand, it doubtless was pandering to Islamophobia on the GOP side of things.
Just as they endlessly pander to the victim ideology of white nationalists.
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